‘Dorcas, if you’ll just stop fizzing with indignation for a moment, I’ll explain about Aline Houdart. I’ll tell you everything I know.’

It took longer than he had expected and three villages had rolled past the windows before he’d finished but at least she didn’t interrupt his account.

‘But she’s so charming and pretty and brave,’ she said finally. ‘And Georges thinks the world of her. The sort of woman anyone would want for their mother. Hard to believe. Have you thought you might have misinterpreted something she said in the dovecote, Joe? Head to head in that charged atmosphere . . . you know how easily you get carried away.’

He refused to rise to this bait and let her mull it over in silence. At last she said: ‘And I wonder if it’s occurred to you that the two women whose claims are still being considered have something in common? They both claimed to have fallen in love at first sight. Oh, dear! I’ve got a useful piece of advice for anyone who declares they’ve fallen in love at first sight: take a second look. I said that to Elsie when she decided to go off with the knife-grinder. She didn’t listen. Disaster! People use it, you know, to excuse any amount of bad behaviour. “Can’t help losing my virginity . . . betraying my wife . . . bashing my old man on the head . . . we just fell in love, you see, at first sight.” Huh!’

‘Heavens, girl! You’d give Romeo and Juliet a wigging then?’

‘Certainly would! I’ve no time for romantics like them. Think of the mayhem they caused.’

Joe interpreted this nonsense as a warning not to enquire into her friendship with Georges and heeded it.

‘Aren’t you bursting with curiosity to see what’s in Charles’s envelope?’ he said. ‘Take a look, if you like.’

Dorcas scrambled over the seat to retrieve it. ‘Addressed to Bonnefoye. Photographs,’ she said. ‘Three. Of Clovis. Surely he must have seen these already?’

‘Yes. But we’ve had further information. Don’t forget the ears. A magnifying glass on these should come up with evidence one way or another.’

‘And Thibaud will be handed over to Aline? Is that what you want, Joe?’

‘I’m here to find out the truth, Dorcas, and see that justice prevails. I’m not a fairy godmother, granting wishes to my favourites.’

She looked sadly at the photograph of the small Georges on his father’s knee. ‘You know that Georges is adamant that he should not return?’

‘Yes. Charles said as much. And there are doubtless complicated reasons for that. But I’m no psychiatrist, Dorcas. Nor are you. Leave it alone.’

‘And this framed one is a party of some sort?’ she said, trying to make sense of the third photograph.

‘Passing out of his year at St Cyr, according to Aline.’

‘Ah, yes. I can spot Clovis. He’s here on the left, with his arms around two of his friends. It’s funny, Joe, we’ve always seen him as a total solitary . . . no one to talk to even if he could talk. But here he’s . . . well, a bit drunk, obviously . . . but matey, popular, supported. What wonderful young men! And now I suppose . . .’

‘I’m afraid so. French cavalrymen didn’t hang back,’ said Joe. ‘One only survived of that merry band, Aline says. Apart from Clovis, of course. And for the same sinister reason – held prisoner in some German hell-hole.’

‘Well, perhaps there’s another contact there? Ah, yes. Of course. Now Bonnefoye can set to work to find him.’

After a moment’s thought she spoke again, tentatively. ‘Joe, you know what people do with these photographic records? So that they won’t ever forget old so-and-so when they’ve grown decrepit and ga-ga? I’ve got a souvenir photo of my last class at the village school and I did it. They write the names on the back. Shall I have a look? It’s only a cardboard frame stuck down at the edges.’

She was already sliding a thumbnail along the join and Joe pulled into the side of the road, intrigued by the operation. Neatly she withdrew the original photograph and scanned the back.

‘Yes! There’s a name in pencil over the head of every one of these men! Now Clovis is on the bottom left . . .’ She turned it over again and got her bearings. ‘So this would be him, the centre of the entwined group of three. The Musketeers! And look, Joe, it says “Self”. Well, that’s it! Your final proof, I’d have thought. No need to go hunting after the missing survivor.’

Joe took the photograph from her and studied it. His hand began to shake.

‘No. You’re quite right, Dorcas. But there’s one man on here we must chase after, to the grave if necessary. What the hell! Sorry. But this is really rather unsettling. You see the man on the extreme left – that’s on Clovis’s right? Musketeer number one? Dark-haired, dishevelled and devilish handsome? Now turn over and look at his name!’

Chapter Twenty-Eight

Bonnefoye was looking mischievous, Joe noticed with apprehension when he entered his office early on Monday morning.

‘Sandilands! My poor fellow – what an unpleasant weekend you must have had! Unearthing bodies much better left lying, I hear. How tiring! Sit down, sit down! Alone today?’ He enquired with warmth after Dorcas. ‘I won’t send for coffee . . . Tell you what – I haven’t had breakfast yet so why don’t we go out into the square and have a café complet when we’re done here? That suit you?’

‘It certainly would,’ said Joe. ‘I dashed out breakfast-less too.’ Then, picking up on the word that had disturbed him in the Inspector’s bland and friendly speech: ‘You hear, you say? From whom do you hear?’

‘Madame Houdart herself telephoned to fill in the details about half an hour ago. She had some pretty disparaging things to say about the methods employed by the arm of the British Law. Bounder? Perfidious Anglo-Saxon? Tool of the Interpol Inquisition? Recognize yourself? She was calling for your head on a plate, I’m afraid, but don’t worry! I squashed her complaints with ringing references to the Minister of the Interior, the Foreign Office . . . everything that occurred to me. I think I quietened her.’

‘She jolly well ought to keep quiet! Concealing a murder is, I presume, something of a crime here in France?’

‘A murder? Would you say so? I understand the body to be that of a runaway, a wounded escaper from the battlefield. Dead of sabre wounds, I’m told.’

‘That’s her story. Now listen to mine. And prepare yourself for some surprises.’

Bonnefoye sighed and paid attention.

‘I understand. And I accept your account of events, Sandilands,’ he said simply when Joe had finished. ‘But you know as well as I that there is no action I can reasonably take. Even if we allow that a murder was committed – and by Clovis Houdart – we’d have insurmountable difficulty in putting a case. We’d be laughed out of court – would that be the phrase?’

‘I think Madame Houdart would approve it. You might even have heard her use something very similar,’ said Joe bitterly.

‘We wouldn’t actually get this as far as court. And the alleged murderer who committed this crime passionnel – which may even have been a case of self-defence – has officially been dead these nine years. If he is still alive, he’s insane. And we aren’t in the business of sending to the guillotine men of unproven identity who are not in possession of their senses. Forget it, Sandilands! Antibes calls.’

‘I agree. I’m not trying to persuade you to follow up this crime, Bonnefoye. I’m asking you to do whatever you can to prevent a further one.’

He laid out his fears for Thibaud should he end up in the dubious care of Aline Houdart. ‘Though how we would ever account to anyone for assigning the patient elsewhere – or nowhere at all, which I suppose is always an option – I have no idea. Since he is her husband, we’d have our work cut out,’ said Joe.